Commissioner’s Update – August 20, 2015

From the Maine Department of Education

Results from the spring 2015 Maine Educational Assessment (MEA) for mathematics and English language arts/literacy are being carefully rolled out. The steps in that process include:

Online Reporting System: Since mid-July, preliminary results have been available to schools/SAUs in the Online Reporting System (ORS) of the assessment portal at me.portal.airast.org. These reports have students placed as they were in the Test Information Distribution System (TIDE), and not necessarily aggregated according to Maine’s decision rules (e.g., exclusion of home-schooled students, outplaced students included with sending district, exclusion of students with special considerations). Access to these results is controlled by the permissions structure in TIDE, which allows for different levels of access. Permissions begin with the superintendent’s designation of a District/System Administrator (DSA). If administration changes have taken place which necessitate the assignment of a new DSA, the current superintendent needs to send an email identifying the designated DSA to the Department’s Bethany Dodge at bethany.l.dodge@maine.gov.

As of July 1 all of Maine DOE’s contracts with agencies and persons providing special education services to state agency clients stipulate that invoices for those services be sent to the school administrative unit. | More